Reviewing business books for The Hamilton Spectator since 1999

Disney’s MVPs

by Jay Robb on May 30, 2007

I was comparing notes with a colleague on our family vacations to the Magic Kingdom (two thumbs up). We then started talking about the Disney Institute. At one of Institute’s stop-overs in Toronto, a Disney HR type asked the crowd to guess who was Disney’s most important employee.

The brave souls who played Mickey and Minney got most of the votes.

The company’s MVPs are actually the cleaning staff. Not only do they keep the parks litter free (try finding a wad of gum on any road or sidewalk). Cleaning staff help visitors find their way and answer endless questions. And they’re Disney’s eyes and ears on the frontlines. So the company invests heavily in training and does a good job treating their cleaning staff with respect.

How valued are the cleaning staff in your organization? Chances are, they were outsourced years ago and they’re pretty much invisible. Yet these are the folks who may well have the greatest impact on face-to-face customer service.

So the next time you’re walking down the hall, don’t ignore them. Stop and say thanks for being an MVP.

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